THE BEST DAY OF MY LIFE: FINDING HOPE AMIDST THE RUINS
In The Best Day of My Life, animation becomes a deeply personal way of exploring love, war, loss, and the hope that survives even when the world around us is falling apart. Through a hand-drawn 2D style and a journey across a devastated Europe, the music video contrasts the ugliness of contemporary reality with the beauty of nature and human connection. We spoke with the director about the inspiration behind the project, collaborating with Ukrainian artists, the challenges of creating the video during wartime, and the importance of telling stories that remind us that love and hope can endure.
How did the idea for The Best Day of My Life come about, and what attracted you most to this particular story?
I already worked with Geoff, the artist, in the past, so when he came to me offering another project, I didnt hesitate. Geoff always open to new ideas and techniques, so I was glad to experiment with the hand drawn style of the video. I liked developing this concept, since the story is somewhat personal to me. With the story we wanted to show the uglieness of our contemorary reality, being surrounded by war, but amidst this chaos people still manage to have hope and grow old togther. This sentimental aspect attracted me to this story.
The story follows a couple travelling across Europe as the world around them gradually falls apart. How did you approach creating this post-apocalyptic atmosphere?
We had a very talanted illustrator on the team. She is currently living in Ukraine, so it was not hard for her to depict real-life landscapes of ruin and destruction. In the beginning of the video we show a youthful couple and a serene sunset, but as the video progresses the amount of ruins grow. Regardless of that, in every scene we still added a piece of beuty and nature.
Why did you decide to tell the story through 2D animation, and what did this medium allow you to express?
With 2D we created stylization that gives you an authentic, hand drawn feel. I believe it adds to the story, that lives in a very subjective, memory-like space, and I wanted the image itself to look a bit surreal. That felt truer to the character's state of mind than a more polished, dimensional look would have.
You also collaborated with Ukrainian artists on the project. How did this collaboration influence the final form of the music video?
The illustrators created the mood, the colors and the world our characters were living in. So the artists played a huge role in the project.
The video deals with war and the experiences of people trying to survive its consequences. Was it challenging to translate such personal and current themes into an animated story?
It definitely required some reasearch. I wanted to create a real route that one can take when leaving Ukraine and heading west. So I layed out a logically connected journey from country to country and gave illustrators the references of all of the places one would go through. If you watch the video a few times, you might notice that the billboards and signs are in differnt languages, firstly in ukrainian (on the border) and then the billboard in bulgarian.
What did the creative process look like, from the initial idea to the final version of the animated music video?
Initially the whole style was suppose to be more flat and monochromatic. But then after the first round of proof of concept, the artist decided to go for more detailed look. That changed our timeline significantly. We had to change illustrators and the whole rendering process became havier, because instead of vector files we worked with larger raster images. Because we changed the style, I had to adjust and quickly learn a new software that would be best for our new look. The collaboration with this artist always pushes my creative boundaries, I love that. The whole team was working remotely, becuase the illustrators were in Ukraine. During summer production time was longer, since Kyiv was massively attacked by drones, so our illustrators couldnt get to the electricity source to countinue the work.
Which part of the production was the biggest challenge for you personally?
Switching from a familiar sowtware to a new one. I felt the time pressure and still had to experiment with different approaches for rigging. So I had to learn on the fly.
Despite its difficult subject matter, the video also carries a sense of hope. Was it important for you that the audience would leave the story with something more than sadness?
Definitely, I am a romantic. I understand the pull of total melancholy, that's why so many of our backgrounds carry that gloom and eerie quiet. But at the end of the day, I still believe in love, and in growing old together. I think it matters not to stay silent about war, about what we're doing to the planet, about the things we'd rather look away from, but alongside that, I want to make work that makes people feel understood, less alone, a little more connected to each other.
What would you like to explore or try as an animator and director in the future? What kind of project or collaboration would be a dream opportunity for you at this stage of your career?
I am a self taught professional all the way, so I am always learning new skills and softwares. So now Im on the journey of improving my 2D animation skills, be it rigged or frame by frame. When it comes to a dream opportunity, I keep coming back to the same things: sustainability, women's rights, queer rights. I understand every client wants something commercial, and I get it, that's the reality we work in. But if I'm allowed to dream a little bigger, I'd want to put my work toward the things that actually matter, the social issues that can nudge the world, and the people in it, toward being more conscious, more respectful of one another.
Since animation is my domain, the dream takes a specific shape for me: a cartoon series built around exactly these topics. It's always easier to shape the ideas of a younger generation than to try to change an older one, so I'd love to make work for children, something that shows them, early on, a better, kinder version of the world than the one we've built so far.
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